Wyoming Trucking Crackdown Leaves 40 Drivers Facing Deportation

The original story by Clair McFarland for Cowboy State Daily.

A three-day sweep of commercial trucks in Laramie County has left 40 drivers in federal custody and facing deportation, after Wyoming law enforcement teamed up with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to target truckers avoiding the port of entry near the Colorado border.

The operation was launched after complaints from other truck drivers, who said some of their competitors were dodging the ports and skirting the rules in the early morning hours.

“It actually surprised me, to be honest with you, how bad of a problem this is,” Laramie County Sheriff Brian Kozak said. “The ratio of unlicensed drivers was unbelievable to me.”

The Laramie County Sheriff’s Office, ICE, and the Wyoming Highway Patrol (WHP) ran the joint operation from Tuesday through Thursday last week, focusing on county roads used by truckers to go around the port of entry.

Kozak said law enforcement set up radar and enforcement details as early as 4 a.m., catching trucks before sunrise.

Over the course of the operation:

• 195 traffic stops were made on county roads;
• WHP also had 10 additional encounters at an inspection point at the port of entry;
• In total, there were roughly 205 contacts with commercial drivers.

All of the traffic stops, Kozak said, were based on observed violations — things like speeding or lighting issues.

Highway Patrol troopers conducted 133 commercial vehicle inspections using federally certified inspectors. The results were eye-opening:

• 62% of inspected trucks had at least one violation;
• 44 trucks and 38 drivers were placed out of service.

According to WHP, the violations included:

• 45 brake system violations;
• 16 licensing problems, including commercial driver’s license or other documentation issues;
• 10 English language proficiency violations;
• 2 drug-related violations.

Alongside those safety checks, ICE officers were focused on immigration status.

By the end of the three days, 40 drivers were in custody and awaiting deportation proceedings. Kozak said that’s roughly one in five of all encounters during the operation.

None of the 40 were taken to the Laramie County Detention Center; ICE had transport on standby and moved them directly to Aurora, Colorado.

The sheriff said some of the individuals had serious criminal histories. One had a prior sexual assault conviction and had been deported twice before. Another, with DUI and larceny convictions, had reportedly been deported five times.

ICE made 12 arrests specifically tied to WHP’s commercial carrier inspections, according to a Highway Patrol statement.

Kozak said the operation wasn’t dreamed up in a vacuum. It started with complaints from truck drivers who are using the port of entry and following state and federal rules, but felt they were competing against others who weren’t.

Lawfully operating drivers told officials that some trucks were routinely slipping around the ports in the pre-dawn hours using county roads.

That prompted the Sheriff’s Office, WHP, and ICE to coordinate a focused effort on those bypass routes.

“From my perspective, we had to respond,” Kozak said, adding that he personally took part in the operation all three days.

WHP leaders say the high violation rate underscores why these kinds of operations matter, especially on smaller roads often used as shortcuts.

The agency called the 62% violation rate “high” and said it shows the need for continued enforcement on bypass routes and “high-risk corridors,” including two-lane highways that see heavy truck traffic but less consistent oversight.

“The safety of Wyoming’s motoring public is our top priority,” WHP Col. Tim Cameron said in a statement. “We will continue to engage in aggressive and proactive enforcement aimed at reducing crashes and ensuring that commercial carriers operating in our state are in full compliance with safety standards.”

Across all agencies involved, the three-day effort led to more than 50 arrests, WHP said.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Wyoming and ICE did not respond to requests for comment by publication time, leaving broader civil rights and policy questions unanswered for now.

What’s clear is that a relatively quiet network of county roads near the Colorado line has suddenly become ground zero in a much bigger fight — over highway safety, immigration enforcement, and what “playing by the rules” really means in Wyoming’s trucking industry.